FROZEN – Disney Finally “Gets” Love

The best thing I can say about FROZEN is that Disney finally did it right. They created a modern fairy tale with meaningful, nuanced, and well-defined values that the plot never deviates from. The story has very clearly defined goals, and by the end, the lessons learned are also earned. (This differentiates the film from its recent peer, BRAVE, which had its heart in the right place, but did not earn its conclusion.)

FROZEN’s greatest weakness (or rather, challenge) is that it starts a bit slow. The conflicts are personal, even internal, with no cackling arch-villain for the audience to boo. The story picks up steam as it progresses though, and as each new character and story point falls into play, things become far more exciting and more humorous.

Yes. The film is very funny. Kristoff’s interactions with his pet reindeer had me laughing harder than I have in a while. And Olaf the snowman was FAR more lovable and amusing than the slapsticky trailers suggest.

As movies go, I might only categorize FROZEN as “Very Good.” It forgoes some of the more iconic elements that the best of Disney’s classics have, and the tunes, while actually pretty good, are less timeless than they are modern Showtune Pop. That said, I have an overwhelming admiration at how far Disney has gone to counter the questionable messaging of their earlier films with this one. While a Little Mermaid taught us that love is what you get when you follow your heart, FROZEN teaches us that love is what you give when you care more about others than your own ambitions.

3D Recommendation: Very classy use of the format! Very clean (like most computer animation). Never once distracting, it adds to the beauty of some of the film’s more exciting sequences!